W&L Community Discusses Honor System Reforms

W&L Community Discusses Honor System Reforms

Respondents to a student poll offer dozens of potential changes to the Honor System.

NOTE: Given the lack of identity verification in the poll, those who filled it out are referred to as “respondents” and not as “students.”
Any students who wish to answer additional questions about the Honor System can do so here. Any alumni who wish to respond to an Honor System poll can do so here. Any faculty or staff members who wish to respond to an Honor System poll can do so here. 

(1909 pamphlet distributed at graduation. | SOURCE: The Spectator)

The Honor System remains a point of heavy debate on the campus of Washington and Lee. 

In an attempt to map out this debate, The Spectator sent out a poll to the student body, receiving over 175 responses. Out of these, over 100 respondents decided to write a written response to the question: “What is one thing you would change about the Honor System?”

While many issues students have with the Honor System stem from the institution’s enforcement (some viewing it as discriminatory, others as either overzealous or overly lax), several students took the opportunity to point out other systemic issues they believed plagued the institution. A close look at the results reveals a wide variety of issues raised by respondents. 

Ten students voiced their support for removing law students from the Honor System’s purview. Some questioned whether law students believe in the Honor System. “Law school and undergrad need to have separate honor systems if the law students believe in double sanction,” one respondent argued. Another stated: “If the law school doesn't believe in the honor system, then maybe they shouldn't be under it … I think undergrads have a very different view than law students.”

One respondent argued that undergraduates should “[s]ecede from the Law School” as law students “do not appreciate” the Honor System. Another claimed that law students “have effectively ruined” the Honor System. 

One respondent had a dire warning for those who oppose bifurcating the Honor System: “Make them separate,” or else they will “drag us down with them.”

This conception of a divide between undergraduates and law students led to other policy proposals. Since law students and undergrads have “a clear distinction” between their communities: “Juries should be majority from the school if the accused party,” one respondent argued. 

Transparency was another subject on many respondents' minds, as multiple respondents claimed that the Honor System required a greater degree of it. The “secretive” institution, as one put it, needs to become more “open and transparent.”

Some respondents felt that “precedent should be considered” when considering what actions “violate the community’s trust.” Three argued that precedent should be “taken into account” when making such decisions. “I would follow precedent and allow precedent to be informative to future decisions,” one responded. 

Some proposed changes to the school’s policy on Open Hearings, which are strictly confidential within the school community. Three respondents argued to the effect that the school should “[c]hange open hearings so that anyone can see them.” 

“It should not be an honor system violation to discuss the proceedings of an open hearing,” another said. “I would change open hearings to be held in the chapel and made more accessible to the student body,” a respondent articulated. Another suggested there should be “[m]ore seats at the open hearing.”

One made an emphatic suggestion about Open Hearing practices: “The open hearing process needs to be reformed: jurors SHOULD NOT BE FR[IE]NDS WITH accused.”

Others proposed operational changes with the school’s Executive Committee (EC). “I think the closed nature of EC meetings should only apply [t]o honor issues and not to budget allocations or other aspects of their operations,” said one respondent. 

Four respondents had issues with the broad definition of “community trust,” the second prong of the equation for determining whether someone has committed an Honor Violation. One wanted to know “what breaching the community trust actually means.” Another wished the White Book would “[b]e more specific than ‘violates the community’s trust.’” One respondent even proposed “[g]etting rid of community trust.”

One took issues with “community trust” in a whole new direction: “people are not honest with themselves about what actually violates their trust.”

Clarity more generally seemed to be an issue many had with the Honor System. Seven students wished for “clearer expectations” (or “Clearer warnings and expectations”). Some wanted to “make sure that it is more concrete where it applies and not,” as “many people don’t know the outline of what counts as cheating.” One argued that “it is unclear and not uniformly enforced, leading to confusion.”

Artificial intelligence (AI) was one area where multiple students called for “[m]ore clear rules” on. “Add a section regarding AI use,” one argued. 

One gave a succinct summary of the different strands of AI. The respondent was “[m]ore negative against generative AI, given that it is inherently a ‘lying machine,’ producing probabilistic results without any check for fidelity/reality/accuracy, and are made from data stolen and plagiarized from human data sets without permission or acknowledgement (inherent flaws in genAI), so I wish campus culture (especially with Open Hearings) would be more against genAI, but this is a societal issue as well and unlikely to be changed on campus without broader societal change,” they argued.

One respondent went to bat defending the White Book’s lack of clarity. “[T]he intentional ambiguity of the White Book allows for the student body to determine what their trust is,” they argued.

Several respondents suggested codifying potential violations of the Honor System as a solution. 

Some supported full codification of all potential Honor Violations (as one put it, “creating a clear set of rules to abide by”). “MAKE IT A CODE!” another respondent demanded.

“The honor system should have sub rules and rules to those sub rules so that the regulations can be more clear on what counts as a breach of the community's trust,” argued a respondent. One respondent opined that “if you write the honor code out and break it, that's different and that's breaking community trust.”

Two respondents supported partial codification. One such individual argued that the school should “[r]eestablish the partially codified nature of the system clearly identifying lying, cheating and stealing as violations.”

“There needs to be clearer guidelines for what constitutes a violation of the honor system,” another responded. 

Three students pointed out the lack of reporting of Honor Violations as a problem. The Honor System must “encourage more student reporting,” one argued. “People are afraid to report their peers,” said one respondent, with another arguing that “students should be more comfortable calling out their peers on cheating.”

Faculty support of the Honor System, or potential lack thereof, was an issue that two students raised. “I think professors like students have a different standard” of reporting Honor Violations, one suggested, adding, “Some give kids zeros, some report to the EC.” “Faculty should be required to support” the Honor System, another argued. 

Some argued against either the current student leadership overseeing the Honor System, or the institution being student-run altogether. 

One of two respondents who raised concerns with the current members of the EC simply responded “[t]he Current Student Leadership” as their primary concern.

Another group of two suggested eliminating the student-run aspect of the Honor System. One argued that the EC should “allow actual legal counsel and/or even professors to have authority in hearing process.” The other suggested: “It’s not gonna keep working if it’s student run.”

Another respondent, inclined to agree with this perspective, laid out an extensive view of their perceived problems with student oversight. “I think that the honor system is focused too much on being student run because most students are too inexperienced and unwise at this age to be making decisions th[at] impact the lives and futures of other students,” the respondent said. “This is especially true at a small school like W&L where rumors spread constantly and you can never be sure if they are true or not, but most students believe them at least partially,” they added. 

Another respondent argued that “a random group of students should not have the authority to expel.” One respondent asked for a “[m]ore rigorous selection process for EC representatives, the community’s vote seems ‘rigged’ with essentially one candidate per sector.”

All in all, when giving “the one thing” that they “would change about the Honor System,” most respondents took the opportunity to criticize perceived flaws in the system. Some students disagreed with that approach, arguing that “the system that we have works,” as one put it. Two suggested that they would change “nothing” about the system. “I think it's good as it is,” another added. 

Yet others argued that the Honor System has been significantly weakened in recent years. Lately, one argued, “the honor code's effect has been significantly weakened. Actions to reform the Honor Code are needed or there is a risk of further jury nulli[f]ication and discriminatory enforcement.”

Which perspective represents the majority of the student body is hard to tell, but it is something the student committee, formed to review the Executive Committee Constitution and the White Book, will have to grapple with.